Electronic games have become a widespread entertainment feature and are well known in the state of the art as video games or gaming machines. To increase the fun of the game many video games offer the option to play against a computer or against other persons. Some games can be played in a one, two or more player mode, to provide virtual adventures, or to economize expensive gaming equipment. There are actually many different gaming simulations such as sports games, car races, strategy games and even war games available. The attraction of some of these games resides in the fact that the games can be played “online” via networks such as the Internet, enabling remote users to access and play different games against each other, while being in different rooms, homes, towns, countries or even continents.
With the proliferation and expansion of electronic games, a number of personal computer (PC)-based content aggregators have arisen to offer users communities of online games from which users can select and play. Examples of such content aggregators include Electronic Arts Inc., Sega Corporation, Microsoft Corporation and Total Entertainment Network. More recently, closed, console-based content aggregators are arising to offer users communities of online games from which users can select and play. Examples of these content aggregators include the Xbox Live™ service offered by Microsoft Corporation and the N-Gage Arena™ service offered by Nokia Corporation.
As the number and expansiveness of electronic games increase, particularly with respect to online games, a number of content aggregators or other game services have started providing or otherwise enabling services such that users can select and play games in online communities, such as in a massively multiplayer manner. These types of games, which are typically referred to as massively multiplayer online games (MMOG's), permit users to log in to a service and play a select online game with a number of other users logged in at various other locations, oftentimes worldwide. Examples of these types of games include Anarchy Online™ (distributed by Funcom Inc.), Dark Age of Camelot™ (distributed by Mythic Entertainment, Inc.), Ragnarok Online™ (distributed by Gravity Interactive, LLC.), Everquest™ (distributed by Sony Online Entertainment Inc.), Star Wars Galaxies™ (distributed by Sony Online Entertainment Inc.), Asheron's Call™ (distributed by Turbine Entertainment Software Corporation), and the SIMS™ family of games (distributed by Electronic Arts Inc.).
As will be appreciated, a number of online games, including a number of MMOG's, include a number of similar elements, attributes and the like. For example, a number of MMOG's provide users with a unique character representation of the user within the respective games, often referred to as an avatar. These avatars, then, often include similar attributes including, for example, physical characteristics such as size, strength and/or power. Also, for example, a number of online games include similar quantitative and/or qualitative measures of achievement or worth, including points, awards, money and the like. Often, MMOG's reflect such measures of achievement in a level of experience of the user's avatar, which may be characterized by a level of experience at different game activities, a level of power, a level of strength and the like of the avatar, and/or items possessed by the avatar (e.g., clothing, weapons, etc.). Further, for example, a number of online games include similar means for users to communicate or otherwise share their game-playing experience with other users, such as by means of friendship or “buddy” relationships with other users.
Although a number of online games share similar elements, attributes and the like, such games currently remain independent of one another such that a user's play of one online game has no bearing on the same user's play of another online game. For example, a measure of achievement reached by a user's avatar in one game is oftentimes not reflected in avatars of the same user in other games. A number of games such as SIMS™ and Everquest™ provide expansions that expand play of a base game. Such expansions, however, are not independent of the base game. As such, users generally cannot play the expansion of an online game without concurrently playing the base game, operating on conjunction with the expansion.